New Delhi: Continuing with the recent spate of inmate attacks in Tihar jail, two inmates lodged in jail number 3 of the prison complex were injured after they attacked each other with improvised sharp-edged objects — making it the fourth such incident inside jail number 3 in the last one month.
Significantly, infamous gangster Ankit Gujjar, was last seen in this jail of Tihar, fighting with jail officials, hours before being found dead in a separate cell. Jail officials have been accused of his murder.
Officials said the most recent attack in jail number 3 took place on Saturday evening when the two inmates started fighting each other. One of them was sent to hospital and his condition is stated to be stable, a senior jail official said, adding that the other prisoner sustained minor injuries.
Since Gujjar's body was found in Tihar jail, his family has insisted that it was jail officials' doing. What added to suspicions was the fact that the prisons department had not immediately lodged an FIR in the matter — a point noted by a court which had eventually directed the registration of an FIR in the matter.
A few weeks into the investigation, the case was transferred by a court to the Central Bureau of Investigation. The Special Crime branch of the federal probe agency is now probing the murder case, in which officials as senior as a Deputy Superintendent of the prison stand accused.
However, more recently, the Delhi High Court had directed that Tihar D-G ensure the protection of all eyewitnesses to the incidents that led to Gujjar's death - many of whom are inmates lodged in jail number 3. Since then, three attacks inside jail number 3 were reported on successive days - September 11, 12, and 13.
On September 11, two inmates of the jail were injured after a clash broke out between them. The inmates had suffered injuries after they attacked each other with sharp edged-objects, officials had said. After the incident, the police had registered an attempt to murder case.
Soon after that two more attacks took place on September 12 and 13 respectively - in both of which two undertrials were injured.
Importantly, the prison authorities have so far maintained that the attacks are not related to each other and are separate incidents.